Lost in Our Love of Convenience

When did shopping get so easy?

I mean, when did we as a society decide that big-store food shopping (like at Costco or Superstore, or any chain grocery store) was the way to go?

I realize that there are advantages in shopping for all your food needs in one place.

The most obvious advantage is time-saving. Finding everything you need in one place saves you time in sourcing your food at multiple locations. Another advantage is convenience.

At your local grocery store, I'm willing to bet that you can get just about anything you want, whenever you want. Seasonal or not, local or not, fresh or not, processed or not, organic or not. Whatever you want, they've probably got.

You know, we're lucky. We really are. And I don't think we really appreciate how lucky we are right now to be able to shop in this way.

Because it wasn't so very long ago that people didn't get their food by shopping at one store. (And in many parts of the world, they still don't.)

I mean not so very long ago--at least in historical terms--most people shopped for food by heading to their local market area or street with their personal shopping basket swinging on their arm.

Every few days, if not every day, they had to visit, speak to and interact with many different shop owners or vendors. They got to hand-pick or choose the items they needed to make their daily meals. Not to mention the health benefits of sourcing and eating a seasonal, local and whole-food based diet. All while discussing the events of the day.

Hey, wait a minute. That sounds kind of fun. That sounds a little like socializing to me. No wonder that historically a town's market square was one of the hubs of village life.

Oh I'm sure there were frustrations. I mean, what if you wanted to make a lovely peach cobbler for dessert but peaches were out of season? That being the case, if you didn't have some peaches preserved at home--or couldn't source peaches from a well-stocked neighbor--why, you'd have to come up with another dessert idea!

Hold on. That sounds like creative problem-solving to me. And that's hard work isn't it--or is it fun, too?

So maybe we are lucky now. But maybe we aren't.

Sure shopping anytime you want is great. And getting anything you want is great. And maybe being able to get it all in one place is great too. All very convenient.

I just wonder: What have we lost in our love for convenience?

In what way do you think we as a society have lost out as a result of our love of convenience?